Maddox Table

(music: Natalie Merchant/lyric: Natalie Merchant)
 the legs of Maddox kitchen tables
 my whole life twisted on a lathe
 in a foreman's torrent
 my first English was
 "faster boy if you want your pay"
 barking commands
 loud and simple
 we could all obey
 then I was forever pulling silvers
 rubbed the sawdust always
 deeper in my eye
 varnish vapor that could linger
 on my skin
 it held tight
 the whine of spinning blades
 still echoes to bother my sleep at night
 see that ox
 stamped dead center
 on the letter head of the company mail
 four decades a spitting image
 of the animal I portrayed
 at Maddox Table a yoke was carved
 for my neck
 sun through the window oil spattered
 and in mason jars
 tricked plenty seeds thrive
 the standing joke
 around the shop was
 with my green thumb
 anything'd grow
 my part was to laugh
 show and ornery jig had
 cut it at the knuckle bone
 see that ox
 trade mark burned
 into every stick of furniture
 from horn to tail
 four decades a spitting image
 of the animal I portrayed
 at Maddox Table a yoke was carved
 for my neck
 was tailor made
 o my Dolly was a weak
 not a burdened girl
 treat her to a piece of vaudville
 a Wintergarden moving picture show
 Bemus Point on July Sundays
 by trolley we'd go
 to your benefit we's strike or bargain
 with the waving fist a union man
 not just for
 smokes spirits candy and cologne
 but for
 automobile keys
 cash in the bank
 and the deed
 on a place called home